Have a look:

New Units

Shape-shifter (Recruited instead of Stone Scribes)
1 hp Rectangle. Init 3. Orb: Bear Form - All Shape-shifters have a health of 2 until the end of the battle. In addition deal <damage>. If this defeats a unit, deal additional <damage>.

Mountain Guardian (Recruited instead of Bolt Throwers)
4 HP Hexagon. Init 5. Orb: deal <damage> for each Ore in the area of the battle.

Development Cards

Crow Form
Cost: Food Wood
Shape-shifters are now Fast, Flying and initiative 2.

Ancients of the Mountain
Cost Ore
Mountain Guardians have now a health of 5.

Veteran Rangers
Cost: Wood Food
When target of a hero or unit ability your Ranger units counts as [square] units.

The Ranger Gather Information ability is now: Gain 1 Influence and deal 1 [rout].

Advanced Windlass
Cost: Ore
Bolt Throwers are now initiative 2.

Rune Striker
Cost: Ore Food
The Stone Scribe Rune of War ability is now: Deal [rout] then deal [damage]. Then you may stand 1 unit or remove all damage token on 1 unit.

Resilience
Cost: Food
Instead of taking damage or rout with a Guard you may take 1 Influence from your supply and place it next to the unit. You may not place more than one Influence on each Guard. Discard all Influence placed in this way at the end of the battle, or when the unit is defeated.

Tunnel System
Cost: Food Ore Wood
Your [triangle], [circle] and [rectangle] units may freely move through red mountain borders.

Capital Stronghold
Cost: Ore Ore
Replace a stronghold in your home realm with your capital stronghold. This capital has a strength of 7 and can have 2 development tokens attached to it.

The costs of the development cards are almost completely arbitrary (but the tunnel system should cost 3 resources at least).

 I just realize now that I have been mixing up Disk Wars with Battlemist. Are both those in the same universe as Runewars or what? Is there Dunwarr Dwarves in both those games?

Hinnyboy said:

Yes and no.

Diskwars and Battlemist ostensibly shared the same universe, back in the day.  Battlemist was upgraded into Runewars, bringing a lot of its own mythology into the Terrinoth setting.  This would arguably also bring Diskwars into the Terrinoth setting, although I would be inclined to give the newer Terrinoth games priority in cases where the fluff conflicts with anything that might be said in Diskwars.

Having never played Diskwars myself, I didn't include anything from it in my fluff compilation.  If someone has a handy source for whatever fluff might exist in Diskwars (I'm guessing it's all in the rulebooks since I don't see the idea of flavour text on die faces working out well =P) I'd be interested to take a look see, at the very least.

Sorry for the delay in my response.

1) You're right in that it isn't a must.  I don't think it should be done any other way.  The original 4 factions were not created individually and then thrown together.  From where I sit I think of "what would an expansion look like?" not merely, "what would a fan made version of Dwarves look like?"  The tie in between Orcs & Dwarves seems inevitable, thus that's how I came up with what I did.

2) I think a group of committed players could come up with Objectives on par with the originals. 

And you and I will have to agree to disagree on how much the concept is disturbed.  I think giving them access to an extra Development imbalances the game more than creating a new one that would apply to any/all Neutral factions.

3) Again, we'll have to agree to disagree.  I think that the total value of any starting TAC/INF should be 5. Moreover, from the above I ask, what then do you do with the Orcs?  If you plan for only the Dwarves in this way it could foul up any other factions that come down the line.

4) If you'd ever be willing to run the final version through a yellow screen and e-mail it to me, I would greatly appreciate it.  Your artwork is very good.  I just think grey would be too confusing given the Heroes.

5) Good.

6) I'm not saying it's a bad ability, nor do I disagree with much of what you said.  But by having an Initiative 3 unit with this ability, and it hits, you effectively take out every other hex unit.  The fact that the Roc deals 4 damage is mitigated by the fact that the Humans were arguably the weakest race prior to the expansion.  Every other Hex unit (except the very situational Obscene) is a base initiative 5 because they are so powerful.  To say that's it's ineffective against weaker units means, what exactly?  I should only try attacking any Dwarf army with at least one bolt thrower with only my weakest units?  It just seems that a unit that eliminates the effectiveness of another unit type (aka, any Hex) will be at least hated by those that don't have it and at the worst very imbalanced.  I

f nothing else is changed, making it Initiative 4 would take out the imbalance I perceive.  Then again, if you like it and the people you know that play with it don't have a problem, leave it.  I think we're thinking so differently that changing to please me wouldn't be very fruitful. :)

7) I only suggested Diskwars because there are already existing units.  Battlemist is obviously what Runewars is based in, but there are definitely units within Diskwars that are idenitifed as the Dunwarr _______ unit for the Dwarves.  As such, instead of reinventing the wheel, I figured it would be easier/possibly more fun to use what already exists.  On the Diskwars page of BGG there is an Excel spreadsheet listed under "Files.  http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/397/disk-wars

8) This just comes down to taste.  i don't like how your final version (at least on BGG) breaks up your most abundant unit onto two dials (every other faction follows this course).  And, if you were truly following the "different like the Elves" your most abundant unit should be on the Ore.  That being said, It does seem really weird that the "Stone Scribe" isn't on Ore.  It could look like...

2 Food: Guard, TAC, Guard, BLANK, Scribe, BLANK, BLANK, Guard

2 Wood: Scribe, INF, TAC, Bolt, INF, Bolt, TAC, INF

3 Ore: Ranger, INF, Ranger, TAC, Ranger, INF, Ranger, TAC

I only think the Bolt Throwers should be on different dials if you start them with 3 Ore.  I don't think they should be able to take over one tile and have access to both Bolt Throwers.

9) I can only point out that every group now has a unit at every initiative number, even the thematically "fast" Elves with the Forest Guardian.  Also, every faction needs a "Fast" unit otherwise the "Flanking Charge" Commander card will be useless.
 

 Thanks again for your input! Even if our opinions might differ in some ways this is extremely valuable to me (or maybe it is because they differ).

1) All right, now I understand what you mean.

2) Well they are not getting an extra, they have one less resource development, but I see what you mean.

3) But giving them a total of 5 would either put them at a slight advantage or at a slight disadvantage depending on if you round up or down. And it would create a further gap between the original faction. E.g. if you were to give them a starting influence of 2.5 the Waiqar faction would have 3 factions with better starting influence in the event of a tie and the Daqan Lords would have only 1.

Maybe them being neutral already gives them an advantage (no opposite alignment for instance) so a slight disadvantage wouldn't be that bad. But still, you can't write 2.5 or 3.5 on the faction sheet can you (is it 2 or 3 influence, new players may ask)? But that is maybe a minor issue.

Give the orcs 3 tactics and 1 influence (or 2 tactics and 2 influence) and they always win a tie with starting influence.

6) By not effective against weak units I mean that if you don't bring a hexagon unit into the battle, the bolt thrower will not be quite as potent a unit. Against 4 reanimates, 2 necromancers and 2 skeleton archers, or 2 knights, 4 footmen and 2 bowmen for instance, they are less effective than a Dark Knight, a Dragon or a Roc for instance. But against 4 reanimates and 2 Dark knights, or 4 footmen and 2 siege towers they would be much more effective. So yes they are nasty against Hex units specifically. And it's only 1/5 chance they get their orb, so they are no way a auto-win unit.

I will create two version (initiative 3 vs 4) and test which is better received by my group. Maybe it's only me... :)

7) Completely agree. Thanks for the link. But holy crap that's a lot of units :) With no pictures or further information it may be hard for me to make use of it. I will certainly use defender though. Now I know what sigmazero's suggestion "Arrow Cannon" comes from (see the first page on Dunwarr Dwarves on BBG). It's worth reconsidering. Would it be suitable?

8) Yes, I think you are beginning to see the complexity of choosing ore as the abundant resource. A big problem is that food and wood have 4 unit slots and ore have 3 "heavy" unit slots (furthermore, wood and ore also have very "fixed" slots -- no faction sheet differs in this regard). I don't want to change this. Another is that ore is more difficult to acquire (more difficult neutral units etc.). Thematically I really want ore to be the abundant resource but mechanically it introduces a lot of problems.

Maybe I should just use food as the abundant resource. Sigmazero pointed out that he thought that they are too mountain oriented anyway.

9) True. I see what I can do (about the FAST trait at least).

And thank you for yours!

2) I missed that and I understand your perspective.

3) Every faction is at an advantage or disadvantage...that's the point of it not being equal.  Once again, if the Dwarves were the only possible faction I understand your point.  As I think there is room for more than one faction, I think the total of 5 makes all the more sense.

And if it was me, I would definitely write down the ".5" numbers on the faction sheet.  I say this because for new players they only need to reference the rulebook once to find out that all ".5" numbers are rounded down, versus referencing the rulebook every time they were trying to remember the tiebreaker scenario.  It's a matter of how many times it's done and looking over it's obvious to everyone that 3.5 is bigger than 3 and smaller than 4.  I would have the Orcs be 3 TAC/2.5 INF.

6) I guess it's just too much of a swing for me.  Either it's very ineffective or it's ridiculously powerful at Initiative 3. 

7) You're welcome.  I agree that it shouldn't be the end all to deciding potential units, but I think it's a good place to start.  I'd have to see the picture of the Arrow Cannon before I decided which term I preferred.

8) I'm not beginning to see necessarily.  I've collaborated with another person and come up with 5 new factions (in total including Banners material) and one of them is an ore abundant group (one that we felt was "more" mountain oriented than the Dwarves).  Moreover, it is known that ore is generally harder to obtain, but that would give an edge to any faction with their weakest unit in ore, if only because their stronger units would be in food & wood.  If this is taken into consideration when building the factions, I don't think it's an issue.

9) Please keep me informed as I'd like to hear your thoughts.

I'll be posting my version of the Dwarves soon.

Here's my version of the Dunwarr Dwarves.  Through collaberation I thought it best to create some new Traits and some new components.  Here they are first:

Stalwart = Units with the Stalwart attribute may not become routed or be forced to retreat by an opponent during a battle.

Taunt = When placing damage to your units in battle, standing units with the Taunt attribute must be assigned damage first.  Assigning damage to already damaged units still applies.

Protection Token = A Protection token may be used at any point during a battle to absorb one damage or to remove one damage from any unit.  Unused tokens are discarded after the battle.

Entangle Token = When a unit has an Entangle token assigned to it, the unit may not draw Fate cards for the remainder of the battle.  In addition, during any battle the unit may not become routed until all other available units have been routed first and the unit cannot be forced to retreat.

Dunwarr Dwarves (Neutral, 2 TAC/3.5 INF)

2 Food – Ranger, Ranger, INF, Blank, Ranger, Blank, Ranger, Blank
2 Wood – Battle, INF, TAC, Defender, INF, Catapult, INF, TAC
3 Ore – TAC, Defender, INF, Catapult, TAC, Battle, TAC, Defender

Name, Initiative/Shape/Health/Number

[DEF] Watchman (Taunt), 1/REC/2/8

Flank: Until the end of the battle, when an enemy unit is damaged, you may deal 1 damage to a standing Watchman (which must be applied to one that is already wounded, if possible) to deal 1 additional damage to that enemy unit.

Ranger, 2/TRI/1/16

Aimed Shot: Deal 1 damage.  Your opponent must assign this to a unit with Initiative 3 or higher (if able).

Defender (Stalwart), 3/REC/2/8

Guard: Stand 1 of your routed units or add one Protection token to your army.

[CAT] War Priest (Stalwart), 3/CIR/2/4

War Chant: Deal 1 rout and add one Protection token to your army.

Battlemaiden, 4/REC/2/8

Threatening: Choose 1 enemy unit with 1 health remaining.  That unit must immediately retreat from the battle.

Catapult, 5/HEX/3/4

Fire Bombs: Deal 2 routs or 3 damage.

Home Realm: Ore, Food/Ore, Wood (Double Mountain at the point)/Ore, Wood, Food (Double Mountain at the point)

Developments:2 Resources, 1 Neutrality Pact (Place 2 Neutral TRI units at the Stronghold), 3 Clan Leader (Immediately before a battle in this area, this token may be discarded to add 3 Protection Tokens to your army.  These Protection Tokens remain until used. This token is discarded after use, but may be built again.)
 

Development Cards:
Reconnaissance – Watchman (1 Food, 1 Ore): Immediately after resolving the secondary ability of a fall Season card, you may rout any number of Watchmen to discard an equal number of Tactics cards and draw that same number from the draw pile.  Any cards gained this way may be used in the same season.
Boldness of Youth – Ranger (1 Food): When an opponent plays a Tactics card against you during battle, you may sacrifice up to 2 of your standing Rangers to deal an equal number of damage to your opponent.
Rousing Song – Defender (1 Food, 1 Ore): When calculating final strength, gain an additional +1 strength for every Defender (standing or routed) in the battle.
Axes of Cool Name – Battlemaiden (1 Wood, 1 Ore): When resolving Fate cards for your Battlemaidens during battle, each damage result instead deals routs of the same number.
Staff of Booming Voice – War Priest (1 Wood): The War Chant ability is now: “Deal 2 routs and add 2 Protection Tokens to your army.”
Salvagers – Catapult (1 Wood): When at least one Catapult is destroyed during a battle, instead of placing it into your reinforcements, you may instead place it in any area of your home realm.  Then place one of your activation tokens in the area if there is not one there already.
Under the Mountains – Faction (1 Food, 2 Ore): Your units may ignore mountain (red) borders.  If the movement of your units passes through a mountain border you may use the Hidden Pass Tactics card to have all of your units gain +1 movement.  You may never retreat through a mountain border.
 

Whoops.  In the above, the Battlemaiden is supposed to have the "Fast" trait.